Nigerian governors have announced that states can only afford to raise the national minimum wage from N18, 000 to N22,500 as against the N30,000 being demanded by organised labour.
The governors said this after an emergency meeting of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum in Abuja late on Tuesday.This was even as the Nigeria Labour Congress and Trade Union Congress held nationwide peaceful protests to sensitise Nigerians to the planned national strike scheduled to begin on November 6.
The two unions are demanding N30,000 as the national minimum wage.
The Federal Government had earlier offered to pay N24, 000 as minimum wage.
Labour had declared that it would order workers to go on strike from November 6, 2018, if government refused to take a decisive action on its demand.
However, the threat of the workers was believed to have forced the governors to convene an emergency meeting.
Governors, therefore, agreed to pay a national minimum wage of N22,500.